Burst Into The Tech Sec­tor

THE KEY PLAY­ERS IN AUS­TRALIAN STAR­TUPS SHARE AD­VICE ON WHAT IT TAKES TO LAND A JOB IN SIL­I­CON BEACH.

Tech start-ups rank among the most at­trac­tive places to work, and grad­u­ates who can hold their own in a cod­ing lan­guage or two can coolly com­mand salaries of six fgures. But it’s not just coders who are in de­mand, with jobs for busi­ness de­vel­op­ers, mar­keters and other hangers-on also on ofer. Here, Aus­tralia’s tech lead­ers share their top tips on what it takes to be em­ployed by the most de­sir­able work­places in the coun­try.

Tech­ni­cal bril­liance

Peo­ple with tech­ni­cal skillsets are in de­mand in Aus­tralia, Sil­i­con Val­ley and glob­ally, says Cam­paign Mon­i­tor’s Kraig Swen­srud. “We’re al­ways on the look­out for peo­ple that have this 10-times qual­ity where they have the abil­ity to im­pact a com­pany in a re­ally sig­nif­cant way. That could be cod­ing skills or prod­uct knowl­edge or knowl­edge of ar­chi­tec­ture and sys­tems in­te­gra­tions. If you are a bril­liant en­gi­neer and you’re at the top of your game, you’re go­ing to be able to com­mand a very good salary. That’s prob­a­bly true in any in­dus­try, but it’s cer­tainly true in tech.”

Ini­tia­tive

Red­bub­ble’s CEO Martin Hosk­ing ex­plains: “The peo­ple in Red­bub­ble are not wait­ing around for some­one to tell them what to do. It’s about demon­strat­ing the ini­tia­tive and the courage to move through an un­cer­tain en­vi­ron­ment. You need to have a cer­tain de­gree of courage to get out and do things that push the en­ve­lope.”

Cre­ative think­ing

Hire­abil­ity comes down to cre­ativ­ity, ac­cord­ing to Black­bird Ven­tures’ Niki Sce­vak. “Tech is as much art as science. In all the great tech peo­ple I know, it’s as much the cre­ative side of the brain rather than the en­gi­neer­ing side. A tech­nol­ogy en­ables the scale of im­pact but ul­ti­mately it’s the cre­ative idea that de­ter­mines whether it’s a suc­cess or fail­ure.”

Prob­lem-solv­ing

Ac­cord­ing to Canva’s Me­lanie Perkins, “Ev­ery­one who joins Canva needs to have ex­cep­tional skills for their role but what makes peo­ple stand out is their at­ti­tude, their cre­ativ­ity and their prob­lem-solv­ing ca­pac­ity.”

Cu­rios­ity

99de­signs’ Patrick Llewellyn ex­plains, “Com­pa­nies are al­ways look­ing for peo­ple who have not just an un­der­stand­ing in the sub­ject mat­ter but a true pas­sion­ate in­ter­est. You need to learn as much as you can about the in­dus­try. Go to start-up events, to talks, read the posts, read the blogs, just im­merse your­self in it and from there it will be clear for you where your pas­sions lie.”

Pas­sion for side projects

“The peo­ple get­ting hired are tal­ented in­di­vid­u­als who have al­ready proven them­selves by prod­ucts they’ve cre­ated for them­selves, and ap­pli­ca­tions they have been in­volved with on the side,” says 99de­signs’ Patrick Llewellyn. Envato’s Cyan Ta’eed agrees. “As an em­ployer, I love see­ing peo­ple out creat­ing things by them­selves, par­tic­i­pat­ing in things like Hack­fest and learn­ing how to cre­ate prod­ucts from scratch.”